Audio File:& Download MP3Transcript:& Lucy Sanders: & Hi. This is Lucy Sanders, NCWIT, the National Center for Women & Information Technology. Today we have another interview with a woman who started an IT company ‑‑ a very innovative company, very technical ‑‑ I'll be talking with her. With me, Larry Nelson, w3w3. Larry. what's going on? Larry Nelson: & We are really interested, in particular, working with entrepreneurs. We love working with women ‑‑ I have four daughters, so I have that leaning. In the mean time at w3w3.com, we have thousands of actual interviews up on our website right now and the better ones, of course, are NCWIT Heroes. Lucy: & Like the one we're talking to today... Larry: & Exactly. Lucy: & ...who happens to be a former Disney Imagineer/Engineer, I have to say, which is pretty cool. I'm sure that she had that little Mickey Mouse on her business card from when she was working there. She has a great passion for large‑scale projects especially, were she can lend her creativity and technology skills together. Being an engineer by training ‑‑ she did go on to become vice president of product development and also software development at Time Warner Cable. Today, we're interviewing Sherisse Hawkins, the co‑founder and CEO of Beneath the Ink. Just a really awesome company that I know she's going to want to tell us a little bit about. But it provides Apples enhancements for E‑Books. It's like you get to provide additional content and not disrupt the flow of your story or the flow of your book. The way authors do that is, they embed these enhancements called Binks which, I think, is so awesome, like beneath the inks. Anyway, they give readers more insight into the characters and data, places and things like that. Just so you can do that if you want to and not disrupt the story either. Before we start, Sherisse, tell us a little bit about what's going on at Beneath the Ink. Sherisse Hawkins: & Beneath the Ink is at a very interesting phase in our life cycle. I think every day is an interesting phase in the life cycle and I was joking with the co‑founder of Loyalty about how we're in what I referred to as engineer or entrepreneur hours. That is every hour of physical work to a week in real world, every week of mine is once a year. It is an incredible fast paced. We're looking at bringing on new authors to the office portal and they are releasing our fifth book this week into world. There's no shortage of excitement and not a lot of sleep. Lucy: & I remember when you were just kind of hatching this idea. How long ago was that? That was, couple of years ago, right? Sherisse: & It was. I actually left my corporate position with a great role. I really enjoyed that phase of my career. It was on Friday, April the 13th. I left my corporate position back in 2012. Lucy: & It's exciting to see you bring this concept forward! I know it's something you are really passionate about. Sherisse, tell us a little bit about how you first got into technology. You have an awesome technical background. How'd you get there? Sherisse: & I really credit my interest in technology and pursuing my education as well as my career, with one person. That was my high school geometry teacher. His name is Mr. Worth. He knows that I speak about him whenever I have an opportunity. He turned math into a very exciting experience. I believed I could conquer anything in his class. I excelled in that particular class. It was through that experience of really loving math and science in his class that made me pursue and even think about taking on an engineering degree. I knew as soon as I left high school that I wanted to be an engineer. It was just a matter of what type. Lucy: & That was a real gift. Excellent teachers. I had a high school math teacher in [inaudible 03:53] that piqued my interest, also. Just that subtle fo